I love my BitTorrent, so when I am away from my home computer and I still want to start up any download at a moment’s notice, I use Dropbox to sync torrents between computers. I use the folder monitoring feature available in most popular BitTorrent applications including, uTorrent for Windows or Mac and Transmission for Mac or Linux.

Your BitTorrent app of choice can monitor your Dropbox folder for new torrent files and automatically open them when they appear in the Dropbox. Practically, this is known as instant remote BitTorrent downloads which I like very much and easy to implement. You can also upload torrent files to Dropbox from the Dropbox web interface that can be done from a computer where you can’t install Dropbox.

There is a quick way to start BitTorrent downloads remotely, if you’re using Dropbox where you must ensure that Dropbox is installed in the computer where you regularly download your torrents, probably your main computer at home. You can get a free account with an extra 250MB of storage if you are not using Dropbox. You must download a small application, which creates a “Dropbox” folder in your “My Documents” folder in Windows or in your “Home” folder in OS X. The Dropbox keeps that folder synchronized across all the computers where you have installed it, so that if you move a file into that folder, it will show up on all the other computers.

Now, most BitTorrent clients are having an option to automatically add torrents copied on a certain folder. It’s in preferences in Transmission, in the “transfers” tab. You can also check the watch for torrent files in option including, check the Trash original torrent files so your folder doesn’t fill up with old torrent files.

In µTorrent, the option is in the preference which is the cog icon in the toolbar, which is right under “directories.” You can check automatically load torrent files and optionally, delete loaded torrent files as well. What you must do is to set those options to watch your Dropbox folder for new torrents, so that they will start downloading automatically when a new file appears.

Note: Don’t set your client to save (You must save them elsewhere) the resulting downloads into your Dropbox folder.

Now, as long as you keep Dropbox and BitTorrent running, you can start the torrents remotely. I started doing this at my office and by the time I get home, my downloads are usually ready.